User blog:Hobandav/07 - Vote for David
David's Opening Speech! �� Hi everyone! I am beyond excited to be at Final Tribal Council... I played this season quite literally as hard as I know how to, but at the same time I tried to never take myself too seriously, I had fun getting to know you all, and I genuinely feel like I will be walking away with several new friendships. Despite a stressful finish, I liked my time in this game a lot, so thank you to everyone that played, and to the hosts for putting it on! ❤️ Before I get into my speech, there is something I want to address: :I know some of the jury feels like they were used by me- that I just pretended to be loyal to them only to toss them aside once I no longer needed them. I just want to say right off the bat that this was never my intention. When I play Survivor, I try to only have a few allies while maintaining good relationships with everyone else. But in this game, I took some of my connections too far, to the point where I had multiple ride or dies that were relying on me to bring them to the end. I never wanted this to happen, but I clicked with so many people that it just naturally did. Now, despite the fact I had five core allies, I still fought hard to protect them. In fact, I got to the Final 6 with literally only my allies remaining, and that was not a coincidence. At that point, it became a matter of being forced to betray people that I was close to and loved. I literally had no other choice. So yes, it is my fault for getting myself into that position in the first place, which I own, but I need everyone to know that I was never purposefully going out of my way to backstab others or to earn meaningless trust from them. Please ask me more about this in your speeches if you have any questions about it!! Okay! Now I want to quickly highlight the main aspects of my game that show what I believe to be strong social, strategic, and physical gameplay. I ultimately chose not to do a round by round summary of my game in order to keep this brief, but if you would prefer to read one please just ask in your speech and I will post! GAME INFLUENCE I believe that I had a ton of influence in how this game played out. This started at the very beginning when I won the challenge that allowed me shape the tribes of the season. I made sure to do this in a way that benefitted me strategically; for instance I knew that Boo and Miguel were getting close, but I wanted Boo to myself, so I booted Miguel to the other tribe and kept Boo on mine. I was also the key mover and shaker in terms of my alliances. I was the one that solidified the trio of me/Boo/Tyler, as well as the one of me/Tyler/Isabel. I planted the seeds, made sure everyone was on board, and also made the chat. Having two trios was quite risky though, plus I didn’t want anyone feeling left out, so I took the initiative mid merge to combine the trios into a group of four. I feel as though this leadership that I displayed is ultimately what allowed us to become the final four of the season, because we likely would not have all found each other if not. My influence also allowed me to shape a significant portion of the actual gameplay and tribals. My alliance made most of the decisions together, but overall I was able to keep the target off of my other allies (Bryce and Adam) while gunning for the people who wanted me gone. I played a large role in getting every tribal to go my way, whether it was approaching others about a plan or constantly asking where their heads were at. As a result of all of this, I was a definite power player in this season. This was shown by the results of Touchy Subjects, where I was named for having the best social game, the best strategic game, running the tribe, and being most likely to win the game. Despite these threatening labels, I managed to remain influential, as I continued to pile the numbers onto my target each round and fight to better my position in the game. INFORMATION FLOW My strong social game made me one of this season’s most informed players. I was constantly being fed information from those who trusted me. I never just sat on the information though, I used it in a way that best positioned myself moving forward. This was seen in the early merge when I heard that Hesh and Miguel made alliances with Boo, Tyler, and Adam. I used this information to help push for a move on Miguel, which freed up my allies and effectively put me in a better spot moving forward. I knew that it was smarter to get rid of Miguel as opposed to Hesh, because he was universally liked and had virtually no target on his back, meaning he could likely cruise deep into the game if he did stay. I also managed to receive crucial information from Patrick during the Courtney vote. I knew that Patrick was on the bottom, but I talked game with him anyways in order to be universally covered. He told me about how Courtney could cast a vote at the next Tribal Council, and that she was willing to use it however he wanted. I acted on this information by ensuring that it was played against Lexi, as she was my alliance’s next target at the time. The last, and best, example of how I gained information and used it to my benefit is the auction, where I ultimately secured 4/12 items all to myself. Basically I used my social connections to figure out what Isabel, Boo, Adam, Bryce, and Tyler were doing with their bids. As a result, I split my money on everything else, knowing that I was guaranteed to be the highest bid on several of them. I also knew Isabel would be getting one half of the idol, so I put a considerable amount on the other half, thereby securing a third idol for us to share. The other items that I got were an idol clue, game information (knowing that the season would have a Final 3 instead of a Final 2), and sadly a disadvantage of needing to sit out of a challenge :( MY PROTECTION I was incredibly protected in this game. So much so that I had zero votes against me up until the Final Four despite being a known power player throughout the merge. The first round of protection was my challenge strength, as I won three individual immunities and was a top tier premerge challenge performer. I also had my two and a half idols, which I didn’t end up needing but were huge shields if things ever went wrong. My strongest layer of protection, however, was the trust that I built along the way. People would come to me whenever they heard my name, such as when Hesh told Adam and Isabel that I was running the show at Final 10, or when Patrick started to turn against me at the Final 8. As a whole, I feel it is a huge testament to my game that I was an incredibly difficult person to make a move against. CONCLUSION Some people wanted to take me far in this game, while others did not. I was constantly analyzing which was which for each person, and adjusted the boot order accordingly. I had plenty of genuine conversations with each one of you, I never let the game get out of my control (until arguably the Final 4), and I always made sure I was actively improving my position. My social connections this season were unmatched, meaning I had several different ways I could have gotten to the end. THANK YOU to anyone that read this all. As someone who does not make the end often, I am very excited for your speeches, even if they are mean!! I conveniently didn’t mention many of my flaws/mistakes in this speech, but I would be more than happy to talk with you about them in the speeches. As a whole, I would be overjoyed to represent this season as the Sole Survivor. I feel I deserve it as well in terms of the three components to the game- outwit outplay and outlast. Sorry again to anyone that I hurt along the way. Love you guys <3 Category:Blog posts Category:Iceland Blogs